


Night Seances

by Cryptid Kel (TheGreatKelthulhu)



Category: Beetlejuice (1988)
Genre: Angst, F/M, seance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:48:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27190637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGreatKelthulhu/pseuds/Cryptid%20Kel
Summary: She wasachingto meet him again, to ask how he’d been, to satisfy her curiosity...She couldn’t just sit through another dinner, another day at school, without wondering about him.And having no answers.
Relationships: Beetlejuice/Lydia Deetz
Comments: 3
Kudos: 32
Collections: Beetlebabes Week





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For Babes Week Halloween 2020!
> 
> The inspiration for this fic was the song "Night Seances" by Feathers.

She still remembered that night.

That night when Barbara and Adam Maitland—two people who truly cared about her, more than her so-called parents did—were being summoned, then nearly exorcised.

She had been seated at the table with everyone else while Otho had read from the handbook. She had remained seated while each half of the couple was summoned, then had started to decay in front of her eyes.

She still remembered what they had looked like—Ancient-looking and crumbling, dressed in their wedding dress and suit, coated in a green glow and looking incredibly miserable, and yet resigned to their horrible fate.

They had been floating there, above her head, getting closer and closer to utter non-existence by the second.

She couldn’t sit through it. She couldn’t watch that happen to them! She _had_ to do something.

Even if it meant seeking the help of a total slimeball, who’d almost killed her father earlier.

She’d swallowed her fear and her pride, rushing over to the town model, desperately looking for the striped dead bastard. She’d found him, of course. Almost like he’d been waiting for something like this to happen.

(Hell, he probably **had** been).

He’d agreed to help—for a price, of course. At that moment, Lydia hadn’t cared what it was. Marriage? Sure. Just as long as he would help her friends.

That went about as well as expected. He’d saved the Maitlands, yes. _That_ part went off without a hitch. But the wedding...well, Lydia had been just a little less than enthusiastic about it, having been coerced and everything. And her groom had ended up eaten by a large sandworm creature.

Not exactly how she’d envisioned her wedding to go.  
(Not exactly how she’d envisioned the dress, either).

Still...it’d been almost a year since that night, and she now found herself a little nostalgic about it.

Sure, she’d been just 16 years old and essentially forced into marrying an old dead guy. But said old dead guy had:  
1) Upheld his end of the deal, just as promised.  
And 2) Had actually been kind of funny, and even _excited_ to marry her.

That was kind of flattering. Boys generally weren’t excited about her at all, so to have a grown (if long dead) man eager to have her as his “ol’ ball and chain”...

She kind of liked it. And the more she thought about it, the more she missed it. Missed _**him** _.

And ever since she’d came to this realization, she hadn’t been able to sleep much. She was _aching_ to meet him again, to ask how he’d been, to satisfy her curiosity...She couldn’t just sit through another dinner, another day at school, without wondering about him.

And having no answers.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The seance spell from this chapter (and the next one) are excerpts from Thomas Lovell Beddoes' poem "Love's Last Messages."

She waited until the star— _ **his**_ star—was visible in the night sky. She waited until everyone else had gone to bed.

She was going to need all the help she could get, if she wanted this to stand a chance of working.

She pulled the poofy red wedding dress out of her closet, and set it neatly on the floor. She then surrounded it with candles; red candle at the southern point, blue candle at the western point, purple candle at the eastern point, and a silver candle at the northern point. Next, she lit them.

Then she opened the handbook—which she’d “borrowed” from Adam and Barbara—and flipped through it until she found the page she wanted, and sat on the floor.

Taking a moment a moment to quell her nerves and make sure that her intentions were clear, she began to read from the handbook.

"_Merry, merry little stream  
Tell me, hast thou seen my dear?  
I left him with an azure dream  
Calmly sleeping on his bier  
But he has fled!  
Moonlight whisper, summer air  
Songster of the groves above  
Tell the maiden rose I wear  
Whether thou has seen my love_"

Lydia could feel the energy in the room subtly begin to shift, and a chill suddenly pass through though the window was closed.

She shut her eyes and pictured her almost-husband’s eyes, blue and cold as the room now was. She shivered, and felt herself become tired, almost like the seance spell was taking more than a bit of energy out of her.

She didn’t know it’d cost her like this. Otho had seemed fine when he started reading the seance spell that night, so she hadn’t expected this one to do anything to her.

Still, she kept her eyes shut, visualized Beetlejuice returning, and kept the candles lit. Her heart belonged to this man, dead as he was, and she wanted to see him again.

But, tonight, she wouldn’t.

As hard as she tried, as much as she focused...he wouldn’t appear.

Lydia snuffed out the candles, closed the book, and put her dress back in the closet.

She would get some rest tonight, but she was determined to try again.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, the seance spell from this chapter (and the previous one) are excerpts from Thomas Lovell Beddoes' poem "Love's Last Messages."

Lydia had tried again. And again. And again. _And again_. For **weeks**. But still, her late fiance never showed.

No matter how hard she tried, how much she focused, how much she _pleaded_ to him...nothing happened. She was left alone in her room, floor littered with an old wedding dress and candle wax.

It was more than a little disheartening. Whenever she visualized him in her mind, his eyes became as cold as the vacuum of space; he looked disinterested, as though he didn’t want to see her.

Lydia felt a stabbing pain her chest each time.

She eventually put all her seance supplies away, and was bitterly accepting the fact that she would have to move on. The seances were making her beyond tired, and for **what**? Beetlejuice never showed.

There were times when she’d have to fight off tears thinking about this, not wanting to let her pain show and have her parents and the Maitlands ask what was wrong.

How in the hell could she tell them that she was heartbroken over the guy who had coerced her into almost-marriage and terrorized them? Barbara would make sure Lydia would never be able to find the book, Adam would ask question after question and insist on getting Juno to help banish Beetlejuice for good, Delia would try to coax Lydia to talk about her pain so she could turn her stepdaughter’s angst into a new art piece, and her father would have a heart attack.

No, she was going to have to suffer in silence. Alone. _Again_.

This went on for a few months, trying to convince herself to ignore her pain and move on, but she couldn’t. She kept thinking about him, wondering about him, _aching_ to see him again.

She was becoming obsessed with him. He’d left with some kind of hold on her. And refused to come back to her.

_That rat bastard. Who the hell did he think he was? Leaving her high and dry like this? He could at least make an appearance and say goodbye, couldn’t he? He **should** , after everything he’d put her through!_

Over the course of a few days, Lydia’s sadness turned to anger, then passion. The fiery emotions were refueling her desire to see her almost-husband again, and _goddammit_ , she **would** this time! She wasn’t going to take no for an answer again.

So, when she saw the star Betelgeuse bright in the night sky, she was more than ready to try again.

She dug her wedding dress out of the closet and set it neatly on the floor. She set a red candle at the southern point, a blue candle at the western point, a purple candle at the eastern point, and a silver candle at the northern point, and lit them. She opened the handbook (once again “borrowed” from her surrogate ghost parents) and sat down on the floor.

She took a moment to collect herself, to focus her passion and intentions, then began to recite the seance spell from the handbook.

" _Merry, merry little stream  
Tell me, hast thou seen my dear?  
I left him with an azure dream  
Calmly sleeping on his bier  
But he has fled!  
Moonlight whisper, summer air  
Songster of the groves above  
Tell the maiden rose I wear  
Whether thou has seen my love_ "

She shut her eyes and pictured the stripe-wearing ghost, her almost-husband, her fiance, Beetlejuice. She wouldn’t let the image of him go out of her mind, especially not when the energy in the room began to shift. She kept the vision of him firmly there, and when his cold blue eyes became even colder, she clenched her fists and strengthened her resolve.

She could feel herself getting tired, almost exhausted, but she stubbornly persisted. She was **going** to see him again, to talk to him again. Whether he liked it or not.

“I know you can hear me,” she said aloud, “I know you can return. I won’t stop until you do.”

The room’s temperature was quite chilly now, and Lydia shivered, but didn’t let it deter her from her goal.

“I want to see you again.”

She felt the house begin to shake, things on her dresser rattled and fell to the floor. The window suddenly popped open, a cold wind blowing in.  
Through her eyelids, she could feel a faint green glow appear then grow brighter and brighter.  
This was a good sign.

“You **will** return. Because I _want_ you to.” She said this with confidence and force.

In her mind’s eye, she could see him; his eyes no longer looked cold, but...mirthful? Excited? Some emotion she couldn’t put a name to.  
But she could put a name to _him_. 

Clearing her throat, taking a breath, she chanted, “Beetlejuice. Beetlejuice. Beetlejuice!”

She felt a wave of utter exhaustion wash over her, nearly causing her to faint...then a sudden burst of energy, that knocked her on her back.

After a moment, she opened her eyes. The green glow was fading away. The house was no longer shaking, but still felt...different, though it was no longer so cold.

Rubbing her eyes, Lydia sat up, and stared at the middle of the candle circle, where her dress was.

There was now someone hovering over it. The someone to whom her heart belonged. She smiled, and the stripe-wearing someone smiled back.

“Long time no see, Babes. You haven’t changed a bit.”


End file.
